Flood Sacks Delta Community, As ex-PG Appeals To FG, State, NDDC For Provision Of Shoreline Protection

Flash flood have sacked several houses and rendered many homeless in sleepy Ikpide-Irri, a riverine community in Isoko South local government area of Delta state, destroying farmlands and properties worth millions of naira.

BIGPEN reports, agricultural produce from the community and other household properties worth about N50 million were destroyed by the flood which submerged the entire community, affecting the only primary school in the community.

Hundreds of residents have also been rendered homeless by the ravaging flood.

Speaking on the demanges done by the nature of the flood, former President General of the community, Chief Joseph Ubeleke, appealed to the federal and Delta state governments as well as the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), to come to their aid by constructing shoreline protection that could an put an end to the erosion and perennial flood in the community.

The chief, lamented the spate of damages the flood had caused the entire community, adding that the community has been going through untold hardship since the beginning of rainy season.

He, therefore called on the federal and Delta state governments as well as Non Governmental Organizations, (NGOs) to come to their aid by way of providing relief materials and financial assistance.

Besides, the community leader, called on the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), and other relevant government agencies concerning the erosion encroachment and devastation done to the community’s river bank.

“The flood is so massive that people now use canoes inside the community. The four quarters in the community, Otehe, Uzi, Ogbuku and Eboh are all submerged by the flood as we talk. Vehicles no longer ply our roads again because the roads are already washed away by the flood.

“We want to use this medium to appeal to the federal and Delta state governments and the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) and other relevant government agencies concerning the erosion encroaching and at the verge of cutting off our community into the river Niger.

“We the people of Ikpide-Irri are using this medium to appeal the governments, NDDC and other relevant bodies to construct for us shoreline protection to put an end to the erosion and perennial flood in the community. As we talk farmlands and other properties lost in the flood worth about N50 million.”

Also speaking, a widow, farmer and petty trader, Mrs. Fulani Udemude, lamented the hardship the current flood has brought to her adding that all she has worked for in this year 2020 especially her farmlands has been destroyed by the flood and appealed to federal and state governments and Non Governmental Organizations, (NGOs) to come to her aid by way of providing relief materials and financial assistance.